Engaging Students Through Technology » Support Services at Penn

Instructional Technology Services & SAS Grant Opportunity

Elizabeth Scheyder — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 16:44:05 +0000

SAS Computing and other groups at Penn offer a variety of services to help faculty use technology in their teaching. These services can help instructors to more actively engage their students in their learning, to bring their research interests into the undergraduate classroom, or even just handle routine activities more efficiently.

We encourage you to visit http://www.sas.upenn.edu/computing/instructional for more information about technology support services. SAS Instructional Technology grants are available to SAS faculty to facilitate activities which require special support. Grants can be used for a variety of purposes, such as

•    learning how to use Blackboard more effectively
•    getting help developing new activities for your students
•    using videoconferencing to bring guest experts into the classroom
•    digitizing teaching materials
•    acquiring special hardware or software for your students to use

Examples of past grants are available at http://www.sas.upenn.edu/computing/instructional/grants/examples

If you’re not sure if you should apply for a grant, please just contact instructional_grants@sas and tell us what’s on your mind. We will be happy to discuss any problems or opportunities you would like to address in your teaching.

If you’re a faculty member in SAS and are ready to apply for a grant, it’s easy to do so. Small grants are available at any time; we’re accepting proposals for medium and large grants through March 27, 2009. For details and application forms, please visit http://www.sas.upenn.edu/computing/teaching_resources/grants

Pre-Recording Computer Demonstrations

Elizabeth Scheyder — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 23:15:32 +0000

Talking anyone through using new software can be difficult. Even explaining the nuances of using an unfamiliar tool or feature in a familiar software package can be difficult unless you’re sitting right next to the person, and one demonstration may not be enough to make a complicated series of clicks and settings “stick” in the other person’s memory.

In cases like this, pre-recording a short computer demonstration may be the solution. Using software for PC or Mac, you can create a click-by-click “screen movie” of the demonstration, and add audio narration and/or text captions. We’ve found this to be very helpful in efficiently disseminating training to users, and we can imagine a wide variety of ways that faculty might use the tool to help their students use applications.

When you’re creating these demos, try to imagine that you haven’t used this particular tool or technique before. Pause after each click to give the viewer a few seconds to take in what has changed on the page, or any other result of the click. Point out any significant things to notice or options when you do the narration or text captions. If you’re taking the viewers through a web page, read out the web address so it’s perfectly clear and there are no confusions between “ell” and “one”, for example.

In Multi-Media Services’ Resource Room, the software to create screen demonstrations is available on PC and on Mac, and you have access to all of the software that is installed in labs. Please see their website at http://www.sas.upenn.edu/computing/mms/mmr for details. If you’d like more tips about how to do this, just contact Elizabeth Scheyder in SAS Computing.